Family Line
by underthemoonandstars
Summary: In the 1800's, two families, the Grangerfords and Shepherdsons, fought a bloody battle to the death. Today, one of the last Shepherdsons journeys to a small town in Kentucky to find her brother and unlock the history of two families who destroyed themselves.


Emma Sophia Shepherdson could think of a lot of things she'd rather be doing right now; watching a movie with friends, shopping, sleeping. Instead, she's driving to backwater Kentucky to retrieve her idiot brother, who has been missing for three days.

Samuel Mark Shepherdson had recently returned home from college with a bachelor's degree in anthropology in his pocket and no job to speak of. Instead of going out and getting one, he'd come back to support his younger sister and mother in the face of his father's, Tom Shepherdson's, untimely demise by boat accident. The gruesome and tragic accident had left Emma and Sam the only remaining blood Shepherdsons, with no known cousins to speak of. Lost in grief, Sam started to fixate himself on this fact, and vivaciously began to pursue his family's history and genealogy.

Which is why Emma hadn't found it weird when, three days ago, she'd found a note stuck on the fridge saying:

**Emma-**

** Found a lead, going to investigate. Be back in a few days, call if you need anything.**

** -Sam**

There was an address written at the bottom, just in case. This wasn't the first time Sam had done something like this. He'd lock himself in his room with a computer for days, and emerge thinking he'd discovered some distant relatives or a historically important family farm, or something, and then hop in his car to investigate further, leaving a crudely written note as the only evidence of his whereabouts.

What Sam failed to realize about his experimentation into genealogy, was that he had no talent with it. He'd run off, scare some poor family by claiming to be related to them, discover he was wrong, deliver an awkward apology, and then drive home the day after he left to repeat the process. The only thing different was that this time he hadn't come back the next day. So Emma tried to call him, and the phone went straight to voicemail. Throughout the next two days she continued calling him, leaving at least sixteen voicemails, several of which included explicit language and demands for him to come home, and twenty-eight texts, all of which included explicit language and demands for him to come home.

By the third day of his absence, Emma had become so worried she knew she'd have to go find him. Especially since their mother was due back from the cruise they sent her on to get the my-husband-died-life's-not-worth-living look out of her eyes in two days. It wouldn't be good for their mother's fragile state of happiness to be ruined by the fact her son was missing.

This is why Emma is driving precariously down a country back road in Kentucky that hadn't been serviced in years. Hitting yet another pot hole, Emma wondered if her GPS system was purposefully leading her down the least opportune way to the address from the bottom of the note, or if it really was this far away from organized society. Either way, the last business she'd seen was a gas station twenty miles back, and she was sick of staring at fields. Emma was a city girl at heart, living in Memphis Tennessee, and was finding the silence and loneliness of the country creepy, as well as the overcast sky threatening to unleash a torrent on her.

Five silent miles later, Emma passed the old, wooden welcome sign to the insignificant little town that, according to his letter, had been her brother's destination. Driving with the Mississippi River on her left, and a field on her right, Emma listened carefully for her GPS's next instructions, knowing she was getting close to her destination. Emma wasn't disappointed when, two minutes later, a charming British accent instructed her to turn right in 0.2 miles.

Driving down another dirt road, Emma began looking for any farmhouse or building to signal her destination. The only thing she noticed was a small, old graveyard. Feeling a little nervous, Emma sped up in order to pass the cemetery quickly. Instead, she heard a loud thump, and her car began to shake erratically. The wheel jerked a few times as the shaking got worse, and Emma was forced to pull over. Unfortunately, Emma was now directly in front of the cemetery.

Getting out of the car, Emma circled around it looking for the source of the shaking. She was not surprised to find her front left tire had blown out. Popping her trunk, Emma rummaged around for a spare tire. Seeing it was missing from its usual spot, she slammed the trunk down in frustration. Still angry, and not entirely sure what she was angry at, Emma ripped her cellphone from her pocket in order to call for help. Flipping her phone open, Emma's eyes zeroed in on the 'no signal' in the top right corner of her screen. She could have thrown her phone in irritation. Instead, she crossed her arms and leaned back against her car with clenched teeth.

While staring ahead towards the graveyard and trying to think of a new plan, the word "Shepherdson" caught Emma's eye and snapped her out of her thoughts. Curious, Emma made sure to lock her pretty much useless vehicle before going to investigate the tombstone with her last name on it.

Walking through the iron gates of the cemetery, Emma couldn't help but look around her to make sure she was alone. She'd never admit it, but cemeteries had always freaked her out. Her keeping track of her surroundings cost her when, because she wasn't looking forward, she full on tripped over a small, square grave marker. Still nervous, Emma hastily pushed herself up and sent out a silent apology to the owner of the grave: Stephen Dowling Bots.

Straightening her light jacket and recomposing herself, Emma continued her trek to the Shepherdson grave on the far left side of the small cemetery. Paying much more attention to her feet, she eventually got to the grave. As it turns out, there wasn't just one Shepherdson buried here; there were dozens. It disturbed Emma to no end to see her last name plastered across so many tombstones. After the initial shock wore off, Emma began to notice trends amongst the graves. All of the tombstones had been standing for at least one hundred years, according to the dates signaling their deaths. Many of the Shepherdsons had died young; very few had made it to the age of forty. They also seemed to die off in groups; the most recent date of death for any of them was shared by seven of them. The last thing Emma noticed was how the graves seemed to get more extravagant over time, with the oldest being rather modest, and the relatively new ones being incredibly fancy, almost as if the family was trying to one-up each other in death.

Emma was considering the fact that maybe her brother was on to something this time, when a voice sounded behind her, scaring her so badly that she nearly stumbled into the grave of John Shepherdson.

"Sad, isn't it? To see an entire family cut down like that." Turning around in a panic, Emma's gaze landed on a scruffy looking gentleman of at least fifty. His beard was streaked with gray, he was wearing a heavy jacket so dirty you couldn't be sure what color it originally was, and his blue eyes sparkled with amusement at her fearful overreaction. "The name's George, by the way," George said while sticking his hand out.

Emma hesitated, before sticking her own out. "Emma, Emma Shepherdson." He grabbed her hand, and shook it with surprising force.

"Shepherdson, you say? We don't here that name much around these parts anymore. I was under the impression there weren't any Shepherdsons left." George seemed to examine her more closely now, it made Emma uncomfortable.

"Why would you think that?" Emma asked, desperately hoping he'd stop sizing her up like that.

"I thought the Grangerfords had killed them all," George replied smoothly, as if the Grangerfords killing off an entire family was a normal occurrence in this town.

"Who are the Grangerfords?" Emma asked, her interest peaked.

"Come on, I'll show you," George offered, already turning around and beginning to walk across the cemetery. Emma hesitated for a moment; she could practically hear her mother screaming warnings at her about following strangers. But Emma was extremely curious now, and George was already halfway across the cemetery.

Shaking away her thoughts, Emma hurried after him. He passed the front gate, and eventually made his way to the far right of the graveyard, stopping in front of a new set of tombstones. As Emma approached, she could clearly see the name Grangerford splashed across them all.

"These are the Grangerfords," George said, motioning to the graves. Like with the Shepherdsons, Emma noticed a few patterns in the stones. They were old, just as old as the Shepherdsons ,and like the Shephersons, seemed to get nicer the fresher they got. It only took Emma a moment to realize that they hadn't been trying to one-up their own family members; they'd been trying to one-up each other.

"Why'd they kill the Shepherdsons?" Emma questioned, already starting to feel a great disdain for these Grangerfords. They were the reason her father's funeral had been full of friends but almost no family. They were the reason her brother felt the need to go on crazy expeditions to find even a trace of a relative. They were the reason she was in this horrible town in the first place.

"Who knows? It was such a long time ago," George said cryptically. Emma had a feeling he knew a lot more than he was letting on. Emma continued to stare at the graves for a few seconds, before ripping her gaze away to stare angrily at the ground.

"Is that your car out front?" George questioned, probably sensing the need for a change in subject.

"Yeah, I blew a tire," Emma remembered sullenly, still not sure what to do about that particular problem.

"Do you need a ride anyplace?" George asked. Emma considered for a moment, before remembering the creepy looks he'd shot her earlier.

"No, but could you tell me where this address is? I'm going there to meet up with my brother; he probably has a spare tire." Emma took her brother's note out of her back pocket, showing George the address. She'd rather walk than get in a car with him, and her statement also served as a way to warn him, if inaccurately, that someone would notice if she went missing.

George's eyebrows seemed to furrow as he read the address. "We're actually pretty close; it's about a mile down the road." He pointed in the direction I had been traveling before my car broke down. "Are you sure you don't want a ride?" He questioned again.

"I'm positive. Thanks for the offer." Emma snatched the address from his hands, and turned to walk toward the gate.

"Nice meeting you, Miss Shepherdson," George called after her. There was an almost mocking tone in his voice that Emma didn't like.

"You too," she replied out of compulsory politeness. Emma turned her head briefly, seeing George continue to stare at the Grangerford graves. She hurried to the front gate, seeing a large, ancient blue truck parked behind hers, as she exited. Emma supposed it belonged to George, and concluded that she definitely made the right decision to walk instead of ride with him.

As she walked, Emma thought about her experience in the graveyard. If she really was related to these Shepherdsons, and she had a feeling she was, then her and her brother may be the final living blood descendants of their family. Her father had been her grandfather's only child, and, as far as she knew, her grandfather had been an only child as well. All Emma knew of her great-grandparents was that she got her middle name from her great-grandmother: Sophia. She had never had any cousins or aunts or uncles on that side of the family, and if they truly had all been killed, she now knew why she didn't have any distant relatives.

It was with these morbid thoughts that Emma approached the gravel path to her destination. Emma began walking up the path, as she heard gravel crunch under her shoes and a distant rumbling from the sky, it would rain soon. She could see a large house up ahead, the center of this plantation. Finally reaching that house, Emma walked up three old wooden steps that groaned threateningly under her weight. The house was obviously ancient, and seemingly vacant of inhabitants. As Emma laid her hand on the door, it creaked open, despite her barely having exerted pressure on it.

Stepping cautiously into the house, Emma turned to look at the door again, and saw half a dozen broken locks, bolts, and chains. Someone had already broken into it. Stepping further into the dark house, Emma took her cellphone out of her pocket as a makeshift flashlight. As she deftly flipped it open, she began to examine her surroundings. There was a thick layer of dust on everything her phone light came into contact with. The dust was so thick that, when she looked down, she could see her own foot prints in the dirt, as well as the foot prints of whoever originally broke in.

Walking into what she assumed was the parlor; Emma gazed at the impressive, red brick fireplace. Or at least she thought it was red, the dust made it hard to know for sure. Above the fireplace was a mantel, and on the mantel; a clock. It was large and was revealed to have, after being wiped down with Emma's jacket sleeve, a delicate glass painting of a town. Emma didn't know much about antiques, but she had a feeling this is the type of clock collectors would kill for. On either side of the clock was a parrot made out of a chalk-like material. Emma was quite disappointed to see such a beautiful clock surrounded by such tacky fixtures.

On either side of the tacky birds were pottery versions of a dog and a cat. Picking up the cat, Emma was surprised to hear it squeak. She dropped it in her shock, and it smashed against the floor. Emma quickly backed away from the mantel before she destroyed anything else. In her haste to get away from the mantel, Emma had backed into a table. Cursing her lack of balance, she began to examine the contents of the table. A basket of fake fruit laid in the center of an old, frayed table cloth with an eagle designed into the center of it. Books were piled on the table as well. After wiping the dust off the titles, Emma gazed at a family Bible, a hymn book, _Pilgrim's Progress,_ _Friendship's Offence_, _Family Medicine_ and a book of Henry Clay's Speeches.

When she finished examining the books, Emma tipped her phone up and examined the walls. Paintings were hung on every wall, some looking highly professional, others were amateur at best. Stepping closer to the inexpert pictures, Emma quickly saw two themes in the art: doom and gloom. They were all of young women in various states of despair, and had morbid names usually ending in the word 'alas.' Emma stepped closer to the one named "Shall I Never See Thee More Alas." In the bottom right corner of the painting was the artist's signature, and it took Emma a moment to decipher the hand writing. The painter had been Emmeline Grangerford.

Emma gasped out loud. Why would a Grangerford painting be in the house her brother had sent her too? Her brother! Sidetracked by her curiosity, Emma had nearly forgotten her purpose for coming here. Backing away from the painting, Emma rushed out of the parlor, now determined to locate her missing sibling. She called out his name, and approached the staircase. As she put her foot on the first step, a huge peal of thunder rocked the house. The storm had started. Emma hurried up the stairs, hearing each one squeak as she stepped on it.

Finally upstairs, Emma was faced with a long hallway of doors. Not knowing what any of them were, she grabbed the first brass door knob on the right. The room she entered had obviously belonged to a young woman. It was filled with books, and oddly, yellowed copies of a newspaper called the _Presbyterian Observer. _Above the bed was another paining by Emmeline Grangerford, just as morbid as the others; the only difference was that this painting was unfinished. That was when Emma started to suspect that this wasn't just any local house. Who would want to own or keep around an unfinished painting? No one, except maybe the painter. Logically, that meant she was in the Grangerford home. But why would her brother want to come to the home of the people who killed half their family? Wouldn't it make more sense for him to have gone to the house the Shepherdsons had lived in?

Upset and confused, Emma quickly left the girls room and went across the hall to the opposite room. This one was another bedroom, but it seemed more masculine than the previous one. There were two beds inside this room, but no sign of her brother. Turning to leave, Emma spotted something lying against the wall. Bringing her phone around to get a better look, Emma saw it was a Civil War era shot gun. Upon closer inspection, Emma saw a small brass plate screwed into it engraved with the name Buck Grangerford. That was all the proof Emma needed to confirm that she was in the Grangerford house after all.

Still examining the gun, Emma was surprised to hear a familiar sound come from downstairs: the smashing of a pottery animal. Emma's mind immediately jumped to George, walking around the house looking for her. Or maybe it was who ever had broken in before her. Either way, Emma was now truly frightened. The thunder crashed again as lightning struck, illuminating the room for the briefest of moments. Seconds after the crash, the tell-tale groan from the stairs started up as whoever was in the house climbed up them quickly. Panicking as the groaning got louder, Emma did the only thing she could think of; she grabbed the gun.

Backing up as silently as possible, Emma sat down on one of the old dusty beds and pointed the fire arm at the door, hoping that whoever was in the house wouldn't enter this room. She heard a few doors open and shut, and then steps right outside of her door. Deafening thunder crashed as the door opened and lightning lit up the room, revealing a masculine silhouette in the door way. Emma, now overwhelmed with terror, pulled the trigger on impulse.

Having never shot a gun before, Emma wasn't prepared for the powerful kick it gave or the deafening noise. Her ears were stunned and ringing for a few seconds, and only after it had subsided did she hear the groaning of her victim. Shocked by what she'd done, Emma threw the gun across the room, where it slid under the other bed, grabbed her phone and approached the writhing mass on the floor. She bent down slightly to get the light closer to the man's face, and was horrified to see her brother staring back at her.

"Sam!" Emma cried in surprise and horror. She looked down to see him desperately clutching his side as blood slid between his fingers.

"Em-mma?" Sam questioned, sounding confused and in pain. "Did, did you shoot me?" His voice was thick with agony, and Emma had just enough time to wonder if his confusion was from shock as she pulled her dirty jacket off to press against the wound.

"Yes, and I'm so sorry Sam!" Emma apologized as tears leaked from her eyes and she dropped to the floor to apply pressure to his injury. Knowing this wouldn't help him in the long run; Emma snatched up her cellphone with bloody fingers and flipped it open. She had never been more upset to see 'no signal' on her phone than in that moment.

"Wh-why?" Sam asked as his breaths turned into pants. Another flash of light lit up the room, allowing Emma a clear view of the blood pooling under her brothers body.

"I thought you were someone else." Emma's excuse sounded pathetic to her own ears. She decided to change the subject, if only to keep him awake and talking while she thought of a plan. "Where were you? I've been here for a while and couldn't find you."

"The slaves quarters," Sam's words were starting to slur together. "Did you know Colonel Saul Grangerford owned over a hundred slaves?"

"No, I didn't know that," Emma replied while she weighed his chances of survival if she were to leave for help. They didn't look good. "Why are we at the Grangerfords anyway? Shouldn't your investigations have led you to an old Shepherdson property?"

When Sam opened his mouth to reply, he was interrupted by the sharp sound of wood smacking against wood with great force. "Miss Shepherdson! Is anyone home?"

The mocking voice of George echoed throughout the house, followed dramatically by a crack of thunder. Emma's eyes widened, and she quickly grabbed her brother under the arms and dragged him into the room, hushing his whine of pain and closing the door as silently as possible.

Emma could hear George walking around downstairs, his gait uneven as he seemed to crash into just about everything possible. Emma quickly theorized that he was drunk. Eventually, he seemed to realize they weren't down there and he began to lumber up the stairs. Panicked, Emma strengthened her grip on her brother as she stuck her arm under a bed, fishing around unsuccessfully for the gun.

Eventually, George made his way to the top of the stairs. Emma heard the sound of splintering wood across the hall, and imagined George kicking down the door of the girl's room she had been in earlier.

Half a minute later, he kicked their door down as well. "There you are Miss Shepherdson. I see you've found your brother." George towered over them in his rain drenched coat, with a shot gun in one hand and a large flashlight in the other that he was shining directly into Emma's face.

"What do you want, George?" Emma questioned while trying to keep the absolute dread out of her voice.

"Retribution. The Shepherdsons killed all of my family and now I'm going to kill the very last of theirs." George propped the flashlight up on a small table in the bedroom so it remained shining on Emma and Sam. He cocked his gun.

"What do you mean the Shepherdsons killed all of your family?" Emma asked, hopelessly trying to buy time by keeping him talking. Not that it mattered, no one was coming for them.

"The Grangerfords! Years ago your family started a fight that ended with nearly all of mine slaughtered! After my dad died, I became the last one! I'm George Grangerford!" He leveled his gun at her face.

"You're not the last one," a small voice broke into the conversation. George and Emma simultaneously looked down at Sam, who now had small rivers of blood leaking out of the corners of his mouth. "We're Grangerfords too."

"You're lying! Exactly what I would expect from Shepherdson scum!" George screamed, now aiming his gun at Sam.

"No. Our great-grandmothers maiden name was Grangerford: Sophia Grangerford. That's why I came out here in the first place." Sam's voice had gotten weaker throughout his explanation, until it was nothing more than a whisper.

George seemed to be having some sort of internal debate about this new information, while Emma sat there hoping he'd let his newly discovered distant relatives go. Her hopes were dashed when she saw his face harden

"Even if you are telling the truth, you're still Shepherdsons." As George prepared to pull the trigger, a shadow emerged from the dark hallway behind him, and tackled him to the ground. A noisy struggle ensued, as one of the figures got shoved into the small table with the flashlight, it went flying off and smashed onto the ground, draping the room in near total darkness. Emma hugged her brother even tighter.

After a few more moments, the sharp crack of a George's gun going off filled the room. Then there was absolute silence. After a moment, Emma heard one of the combatants stand up. There was a rustle of cloth and then the bright click of another flashlight. The line of light zeroed in on the figure lying motionless on the ground, it was George Grangerford.

"Killed by his own gun. It almost seems poetic somehow," the owner of the flashlight muttered, Emma's eyes snapped away from George and over to her rescuer. He was pretty tall, with dark skin, and kind eyes.

"Who are you?" She questioned, nervous that he'd turn on them, too.

"Jiminy Twain, town Sherriff. I heard George at the bar yelling about killing Shepherdsons. I followed him out here to make sure he didn't cause any property damage. I had no idea there were Shepherdsons that he was actually planning on hurting," Jiminy's eyes traveled down to Sam, who had passed out from blood loss.

"Quick, let's get him to the police cruiser. He's not looking too good." With a gentleness shocking for a man his size, Jiminy scooped Sam up into his arms, and hurried toward his car with Emma right at his heels.

Laying her brother in the backseat, Jiminy hurried to the driver's seat while Emma climbed in the back to continue pressing down on his wound. George Grangerfords body would be collected the next day.

Jiminy Twain drove as fast as he could to the nearest hospital with his lights and sirens going, but in the end, it wasn't enough. Samuel Mark Shepherdson succumbed to his wounds and died shortly after arriving at the hospital. Unintentionally, the last Grangerford had killed the last Shepherdson, they just happened to be brother and sister.


End file.
